The Broncos have finally traded Trashley Le…all right, that’s uncalled for. Rather, the Broncos have finally unloaded up-and-coming malcontent receiver Ashley Lelie in a three-team trade with Atlanta and Washington.
In the trade, the Broncos get…it’s a good deal, whatever we got. Lelie thought complaining about his role on a very good squad would make him irresistible to other NFL teams. Didn’t work out that way. After months of waiting, the Broncos got some draft picks, at least a third and a fourth-rounder.
Although I think I’ve already covered it, let me say again that Ashley Lelie is insane. With fines for missing camp and the $100,000 workout bonus he skipped out on, he cost himself somewhere in the area of half a million dollars this offseason just to get away from Denver.
Half a million dollars. Do you know how much that can buy? Me neither. But I’d sure love to find out.
Actually, it gets better. According to the Denver Post, the Broncos are trying to get some of Lelie’s signing bonus back, as well. Lelie is nuts, but it really bothers me when teams take back money they’ve already paid. (Besides, don't you get a signing bonus for signing? And didn't he sign?) In any event, the Post estimates Lelie’s holdout could cost him, in total, more than a million dollars.
Is it refreshing these days to see someone take a stand when it costs them a boatload of cash? Not really. Okay, it’s nice, but I have no idea why Lelie was so frustrated in Denver in the first place. I’m sure he wanted more passes, and Mike Shanahan definitely isn’t the easiest guy in the world to play for. In fact, if he was my boss, I would lose my mind. The only public story I’ve heard so far is that Lelie was unhappy with his role, but if that's all it was, didn’t he go way overboard?
Besides, he leaves the Broncos, where he was the number three receiver, for the Falcons, where he’ll once again be the number three receiver. Are Vick’s passes going to be more accurate or easier to catch than Plummer’s? What do you think? As ESPN’s Sunday night crew can sadly no longer inform us, the presence of Vick means Lelie won’t even be the fastest player in his own huddle! (And of course, they would have been talking about Vick during a thrilling matchup between AFC contenders…but I digress.)
I don’t think the Falcons are a better team than the Broncos, either, though they stack up in the inferior conference about as well as the Broncos do in the AFC. So he lost a cool mill to get the same role on a similar team. Well played.
As for the Broncos, the draft picks could play out a lot of different ways-read the Post article for more info. If we just get a 2007 3rd and a 2008 4th, that’s not very much. A healthy and productive Lelie would have been much more useful in the short term...but that wasn’t going to happen. I’m not sure we’ll get anything out of those picks, but I don’t fault the Broncos. I just don’t think there was much interest in Lelie in the first place. The Falcons can only hope it’s a wake-up call.
3 comments:
Ha, when I first read that I thought you said Dayne and Duckett were oversized retards. Completely inappropriate.
Yeah, I was kind of thinking the same thing-Duckett's a beast, though I just looked him up and he had 3.1 per carry last year. Yikes. I don't think it really matters-we don't stick with a particular running back long enough for any one guy to make a difference, anyway. Duckett would have run up 1,250 for us this year, then been traded to Cleveland for their fifth and sixth-best defensive linemen anyway.
I told you that game rocked!
i just don't understand what he was thinking. you can't demand to be the no. 1 when you don't play like one. what a dummy.
good riddance, i like the idea of that brandon marshall, and with schaeffler... i'm all about those western michigan players
I agree, Pugs, and I think the Broncos would have loved for him to start playing like a stud and treating him appropriately. It's not like he didn't get the opportunities-it seemed like once a game he'd be open forty yards down the sideline and Plummer would hit him in the hands. Too bad Lelie dives elbows first and knocks the ball away from himself. I honestly do not comprehend how a professional football-catcher can be bad at catching a football.
Cap, yes, a first for two later-rounders years later is not a good move in a vacuum. But at least it's not a disaster move, and in the NFL it often seems that avoiding those is more important than doing anything particularly smart.
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